This report covers our trip to the Club Med "Turkoise" on the Turks
& Cacios Islands from Sept 21 - Sept 28, 2002. This was about our
11th Club Med visit and our third visit to the Turkoise club, so we
pretty well knew what to expect.

The Turkoise club is an "Adults Only" club and attracts a lot of
singles and active couples. I'd guess that the GMs were about equally
split between couples and singles. There is a 'singles' room in the main
restaurant and it appeared to have about the same number of people
as the regular room (although there were some singles in the regular
room). Although I've heard stories about rather wild times in the
Singles room, it appeared to be rather well behaved while we were there,
although certainly not exactly quiet.

The Providenciales Airport

Getting there and Back:

Arrangements were made by Hal Segal of LeBeach Club travel and
everything was in order. We got very good flights, allowing a little
more time at the club, without either very early or very late flights.
All flights were American Airlines (part the Club Med package) and
were either on time or slightly early, a pleasant change from the
last trip here when most flights were running late.

The only problem at all was encountered on
Check-in.... although we had requested a king-size bed, we got a
room with two small beds. Normally we would just shove the beds
together, but in this case room layout did not lend itself to that
approach. We went back to reception and they did not have any king
bed rooms available until the next (Sunday) afternoon. We did
do the change on Sunday and ended up with a nice 1st floor room
close to the SCUBA end of the village.

We go on vacation to sail, windsurf, snorkel, eat, and do
some sightseeing. We go to Club Meds because we have found
that they consistently have the best of these facilities and
Turkoise did not disappoint us. There is really little
traditional 'sightseeing' to do on Turks & Cacios with off-club
expeditions generally limited to various boat trips to islands
and fishing/snorkeling.
Although CM/Turkoise offers a
good Tennis program, beach and pool
activities, an active bar scene, and significant late-night
activities, we did not participate in these pastimes, so I
won't attempt to report on them. I did notice that there seemed
to be fewer organized late-night activities than at the Cancun
club earlier this year.

I'll break the rest of this report into

Club facilities

Food & Beverage

Sports activities

Entertainment

Miscellaneous

Swimming pool, ocean in distance

Club Facilities:

Main bar area, next to pool area

The Turkoise Club was built in 1984 and had a minor renovation about
three or four years ago. Although there has been some painting and
general maintenance, the club is starting to show it's age. The
mechanical components (air conditioners, water system, electrical
system) all had minor problems during our stay. None of problems
were serious and we had only minor inconvenience, but it does
indicate that additional work is needed. (See the 'Miscellaneous'
section for more on this.) The club has about 300 rooms and I'd
estimate that it was about 2/3 full the week we were there. (Many
of the GMs were Travel agents because Club Med had offered very
attractive deals to TAs.)

The guest rooms are fairly basic, reasonable size, with tile floors
and baths, and basic but sufficient furniture. Housekeeping was
generally very good, with the floors being mopped every day.
There were some bugs in our ground floor room, but not bad.
All rooms have TV (about 12 channels, including HBO, ShowTime,
CNN, and Weather Channel, which got watched a lot this week) and
telephone. The SCUBA and snorkeling facilities and pier are at
the north end of the club; the reception, main restaurant, main
bar, theater, boutique, and pool are in the center; and the sailing,
tennis, and circus facilities are at the south end of the club.
The annex restaurant (The Grill) is also on the south end, as is
Sharkey's bar. The Club is located on the northern part of Grace
Bay, so the beach to the south extended for about 10 miles. The
beach itself is very nice; light yellow, fine sand, and reef
protected so there are no large waves crashing onto the beach.
Several other resorts have located along Grace bay in recent
years but it's still a relatively unpopulated beach, especially
at this time of year.

Path from Sharkeys Bar to the Sailing Shack

Club Med rates Turkoise
as a three trident village, which is about right when compared
to other villages we have been to.
The theater is open air, as are most CM theaters, and the seating
was reasonably comfortable. I recommend finding seats in the
left rear in order to catch what breezes might be around. The
bar is also open-air and it did sometimes get rather warm (perhaps
encouraging guests to drink more??). The restaurants are enclosed
and somewhat air conditioned, but the main restaurant was
frequently rather hot, especially at lunch; it was actually cooler
outside at times. We don't generally cool our room very low, but
we left the controls at full cold during our stay. Guests who like
their room at 72 degrees (F) might find things a little warm.

Food and Beverage

Salad table in main restaurant

The food was a little better than on our last visit. In general,
most of the food was ok, although nothing special. However, at
almost every meal there were one or two special or unusual dishes
that made the difference. On Italian night, for instance, they
served "homemade" pasta and cooked your selection of sauce
ingredients to order... recommended! The food is still not up
to the more 'international' clubs, such as Columbus Isle or
Guadeloupe, but we certainly did not go hungry. There were always
several fish dishes, as well as the normal beef, pork and chicken.
As I had found at Cancun, the salad chef apparently likes green
pepper much more than I do and it appeared in many of the prepared
salads. The full selection of traditional Club Med breads was
there, including the sinful white chocolate bread. Deserts were
good, although at lunch we especially enjoyed the soft-serve
ice-cream because of the heat.

The club was pushing the bar braclet this time: $200 bought you
7 days of almost any beverage you wanted at any time. I would
guess that probably 1/3 of the GMs bought the bracelet. We
talked to one GM who had found that CM offers (but does not
advertise) a non-alcoholic bracelet: water, soft drinks and
juices at any time at $57 for the seven days. We heard some
discussion that Club Med was going to go to a full all-inclusive
as a test at couple of clubs in the near future. As at most
Club Meds, the main restraunt seating was at tables of 8 people.
This generally provides for interesting conversations and the
chance to meet people. In the past, seating was generally done
by GOs (probably from reception) and was done 'intelligently'
based on the age and language of the GMs being seated. However,
it appears that at least some of the clubs, including Turkoise,
have gone to seating by the local employees and the only
consideration appears to be to efficiently fill the tables.
We were sometimes seated with young people who were more interested
in drinking than in conversation or with French speaking people who
preferred to not speak English. I would certainly encourage a
return to the previous methods of seating GMs. Since we enjoy the
large tables and most seating at the Grill is small tables, we did
not eat down there (it was only open three evenings). The main
restaurant was frequently too warm for comfortable eating,
especially at lunch. Even in the evening, it was a bit too
warm to be able to really enjoy an after dinner coffee. The
main restaurant is scheduled to close for renovations as we
were leaving. I don't know how extensive the renovations are
to be, but I hope the air-conditioning problem is addressed.

Desert table for Fridays dinner

Sports and Activities

Sailing Shack with Windsurfer sails in loft

Our main interests are windsurfing, sailing, and snorkeling so
I'll report on these in some detail. There are many other
activities available and I'll pass along what I observed and
heard from other GMs. We were very lucky in that we had
unusually good winds for sailing the week we were there. We
were able to get in at least one good sail and windsurfing run
every day. They have a reasonable selection of windsurfing
equipment; mostly large beginner boards, a few 328s and a number
of short boards and they had a corresponding selection of sails.
Not the very best or newest equipment, but reasonable and better
than all but the dedicated windsurfing resorts. Some of the sails
and wishbones were getting a little rough and needed either
replacement or repair.

They had both Hobie Waves (10) and
Hobie 15s (5). The 15s are a special design for Club Med and use
a rig similar to a Hobie 16 but with a 'soft boom'. Since the 15
is probably lighter than a 16, the performance is very good. We
only ended up on a Wave one time, and
then swapped it for a 15 in a little while. The Waves are very
good beginner boats, being relatively stable and difficult to upset.
The 15s, however, can bite and we saw a number of unsuspecting
sailors get upset in them. In all honesty, however, it was not
always the fault of the sailor... Although the sailing GOs were
generally very pleasant and helpful, they were not doing the
necessary regular maintenance work on the boats. Sailboats,
especially at a resort such as this, require almost constant
attention and repairs; otherwise, small problems because large
ones quickly. We encountered too many instances of rudders that
would not lock down, hiking straps that were broken or missing,
sails improperly rigged, and other such problems. We agreed that
Turkoise needs a "Grek". Grek was the chief of sailing at Cancun
earlier this year and he took excellent care of "his" boats. I
think the sailing GOs are capable, and during light weeks such as
this one, they have the time. They just need some better guidence
and instruction. The sailing team did take the extra effort to
organize and lead a "sail-away" to Iguana island Friday afternoon
which went very well and was fun.

Some boats on the beach

SCUBA/Snorkel Dock with SCUBA boat docked

There were two snorkeling trips every day on the dedicated
snorkeling 'barge' (large platform boat) going to about 6 or
7 different locations. Visibility was good and there was a wide
variety of coral and reef formations and fish. The morning trip
was generally less crowded than in the afternoon and the water
was usually a little calmer in the morning.
There is a major SCUBA program at Turkoise and I heard numerous
good comments. The boats and equipment appeared top notch, easily
putting to shame the boats from the other resorts. The circus
program appeared to be popular but we never saw much activity at
the tennis courts although beginner, intermediate, and advance
classes were offered.

Entertainment

There were the normal Club Med evening entertainment shows put
on by the GOs. However, unlike our visits to Columbus Isle
(last Sept) and Cancun (this April) they were generally at the
same level of non-professionalism as we've seen in the past.
(Cancun and CI seemed to have upgraded the level of the shows
significantly.) There was no disco room, with dancing in the
open until about 2:00AM when Sharkey's bar opened (or so I was
told). There were also the normal 'Crazy Signs" dances and pool
games during the day. There was also a "Foam party" one night
in front of the theater.

Good view of the long beach area

Miscellaneous

Typical cloudy sunset on the beach

There is a lot to cover in this section, as there were a lot
of things going on (or about to go on) at the club. There is
apparently going to be a renovation activity at the club,
although it is not clear just how complete the work would be.
The pool was closed on Saturday morning just before we left.
The main restaurant was to have closed that Saturday also,
but we saw no indication of that happening. On Friday evening
after the show the Chief of the Village (Joey) had a meeting
with the GOs to tell them what was going to happen, but I heard
lots of whispered questions and rumors on Saturday. The
consensus seemed to be that half the guest rooms of the club
and the main restaurant would be closed and renovations started.
They would keep the club open, but would cut back on the GO staff
(since it is almost time for the normal GO rotation, this is
probably the best time to start this.) Without the main
restaurant open, the number of GMs will have to be limited
since the Grill is not that large. I heard no indication as
to how long the work would take and whether the other half of
the village would then be renovated also.

Completely by coincidence (I assume) the day after we got home,
I got an email from Club Med asking me to take a survey about a
possible new CM "product". Turns out that Club Med is
considering 'converting' some of the club rooms into a "Timeshare"
facility. As I understand it, GMs would buy a share that would
give them a week at any of the North America villages in
significantly upgraded rooms. The 'share' would be good for
10 years (although 30 years was also mentioned). Interesting
idea, but given the apparent financial situation of Club Med,
I'd tend to be a bit cautious.